Team members:Natalia Savina — always-going-somewhere-nerd
Alexandra Kokacheva — for-any-drivel-artist
Ekaterina Muravieva — artist
Sergey Morozov — visiting director from Moscow
Ivan Maximov — elusive St. Petersburg carpenter
Dmitriy Letunovskiy — suddenly appeared coordinator
Stages of team work:- Googled, looked at pictures and videos with the Pryazhka river, found out that the Russian singer Shnur goes jogging and hangs out with the local "blue knights” here
- Came up with a lot of questions to torment people
- Molested people, asked questions, filmed and photographed them
- Created the Non-Implemented Concept I "More Venus”; drank in the studio of a well-known modern artist; a well-known contemporary artist left our team (it was his own will!)
- Created the Non-Implemented Concept II "All in the bath-house”
- Created the Non-Implemented Concept III " Three Circles”
- Created the Non-Implemented Concept IV " Stockholm Column and Drag-Pallets Amphitheatre”
- Caught Zen and created Please-Embody Concept V
- Held GREAT events
Data collection and analysis methods:- Walked back and forth alongside the Pryazhka river
- Looked at who was doing what and how on the Pryazhka; sometimes were genuinely surprised
- Met people and tormented them with questions about the river; some (whom we called “experts”) we tormented longer
- Did tons of photos and video pieces
Events:- Art intervention "The Spirits of the Kolomna Trees"
- Performance "Venus is near”, dedicated to the Venus of Kolomna sculpture
- Historical and informal excursions
- Lecture-discussion for local activists and artists on how to unite and change their place of residence
- Introduction and further discussion on the issues of Pryazhka river among the activists of Kolomna; community building
What has been done?Perhaps the main conclusion that the Pryazhka team managed to make is that transforming the urban environment in the historical center is a difficult task. And the most difficult thing here is to understand in time what do the locals really want. Maybe they are satisfied with the things as they are? The team managed to get to know and communicate with the residents of Kolomna — they are interesting and friendly people. And it is important for them that the Pryazhka remains as it is (minus the trash around it).